Saturday, 27 July 2013

The humidity has broken!
Hoorah! I’m not too sure I can
cope with any more sleepless nights. My
keyboard is looking very inviting as a pillow right now.

Anyway, today I would like to show a card I made whilst
experimenting with my colouring. (To be fair I am always experimenting
with my colouring but there you go.) Of
course I reached for one of my new (well new to me) Saturated Canary stamps and the one I chose was Nevaeh (sorry, sweetie).

I call this card, ‘Whatever the Feather ’.

Crystal glitter, gems and feathers - these are a few of my favourite things!

So I didn’t want to make it easy for myself did I? I chose one of the most challenging hair
colours out there but I wanted this for my sister-in-law and as her hair is black
(selfish) I had to go for it. It may
have been easier to buy her a box of Nice ‘n’ Easy though! So with my usual gung-ho attitude I went for
it.

Well poor Nevaeh (sorry again, sweetie) was my guinea pig
and I coloured her using Pro & Flexmarkers.

As always I chose my DP’s ( by Kate Knight) and then picked
my markers to match.

I thought I would do an easel card as I love this fold and think
it looks so good. However it is not the
most non-crafter friendly fold there is.
Most recipients of this type of card need the mechanism explaining to
them. I gave an easel card to a work colleague once and it wasn’t until half
way through the day that I noticed she had it on her desk on its side! It seems the fact that the image and
sentiment were all facing the wrong way had not seemed strange to her in the
least! Hey ho. Maybe in future I will add
‘how-its-supposed-to-go’ instructions.

Smiling always (well, I’m feeling cooler)!

Jane x

Now to the interesting (for me) bit, I would like to enter
my card into the following challenges:

Saturday, 20 July 2013

Oh dear, it’s another scorching and humid day here in the
south. If anyone would like to prod me
I’m sure I’m well and truly cooked!!
Crikey, I don’t do hot weather very well, my craft room is like a sauna. Sorry, don’t mind me, I could moan for
Britain!

Anyway first things first, thank you so much for all the
lovely comments I received from the DT members of the challenges I entered with
my last two cards. I had no idea what a
moral boost it would be to have someone say something nice about one of your
creations (my family are not very forthcoming about that sort of thing). So once again, thank you for taking the time
to do that. It means a lot to all us
challenge entrants I can tell you.

Any road up here is today’s card. I have named it ‘Bunting Bonanza’.

I have just come into possession (legally of course) of my
first Saturated Canary Little Darlings Stamps.
(Well done, Jane; way to go catching up with the times! :D) What gorgeous images they are and the quality
of the stamps themselves (maybe not my stamping) is excellent.

Anyway I used Krafty Kate, she’s having a fine time making
her bunting, and coloured her using my Flex & Promarkers.

Now I saw the current challenge on the Graphit Markers Blog asking to use your favourite candy colours and my favourite sweets of all time are
Raspberry Ruffles. For those of you who
have not heard of them they are raspberry flavoured desiccated coconut sweeties
covered in dark chocolate.
Deeeeelish!! I actually haven’t
had one for quite a while. I remember
always getting them at Christmas in a Pick ‘n’ Mix bag from Woolies (sniff). I absolutely love them. In fact it was a toss-up between them and
Jelly Babies but the colour palette for Jelly Babies is rather broad to say the
least!

{Note to self: I have
just discovered that Raspberry Ruffles now come in a BAR! OMG!
Be still my beating heart (and ever increasing waistline).}

Anyway, I digress. I
sought out my raspberry and dark chocolate colours (sorry, just drooling then)
and then picked out my markers.

Shrink plastic cotton reel & scissors.

I decided to extend the bunting theme throughout so that
Kate was surrounded by her creation.

The DP’s are Brenda Pinnock’s. This is a huge 12 x 12” pad I have had for
donkey’s years. It’s proved very useful,
and I always seem to find exactly what I’m looking for in it.

I cardalso used American Crafts, Silky Crush Ribbon and my favourite La-La-Land banner die. The corners are from Tattered Lace.

Smiling always (well, thinking of Raspberry Ruffles of
course)!

Jane x

Now to the ‘not too sure what I’m doing’ bit; I would like
to enter my card into the following challenges:

Tuesday, 16 July 2013

Wow another night of broken sleep. Not helped by the fact that my dogs insist on
sleeping in the room with me, heating it up by another few degrees. I never thought I would say it but BRING ON
THE WINTER! Sorry, hope I haven’t jinxed
the rest of the season.

Any road up, to my card for today. I call it (imaginatively) ‘Just a Touch
of Pink’.

Pink and pearls, what could be better!

I have to say that this is the pinkest item I have ever made.
Not too sure why as I love pink. I have
to admit to being quite surprised as to how many shades of pink there are,
borne out by my variety of Pro and Flexmarkers (used for the colouring) and all
the beautiful papers I have. Never
underestimate the power of pink!

My gorgeous image is another stunner from LOTV. I love her oversized dress and shoes and I
thought she deserved a ‘real’ pearl necklace and bracelet.

I used kraft card for my base and the DP’s are EMMA’S GARDEN
by Jennifer Ellory. I made the flowers
from tissue paper using the Delicate Asters die from Spellbinders, and
using tissue paper meant I could cut 8
flowers in one go.

I hope that necklace is not too heavy for her!

The other dies I used were SB (what else) Labels 23 and A2
Scalloped Border. I love both these dies
but have had them quite a while and never used them (for shame). That won’t happen again.

Monday, 15 July 2013

Well here in Oxfordshire the sun is threatening to melt me
so it’s indoors for crafting and sitting in front of the fan.

Now fans and paper are not a match made in heaven and after
chasing my doily’s round my craft room for the third time I decided to turn it
off.

So here is my effort for today. I call it ‘Keep Your Eye on the Slice!’

Whose going to get that cake?

I coloured the image using my Pro & Flexmarkers, the
image being TEDDY BEARS PICNIC from LOTV of course, and all the little bears appear
to be eyeing up the last slice of cake.
Not too sure who my money is on the claim that prize!

They are all the same colour, it's just that the light is coming from the right (oops)

My DP’s are from Dovecraft and are appropriately call TEA
PARTY.The dies are Spellbinders Scalloped,
Picot Edge and Tear Drop circles and a La-La Land bunting banner.

Being still ever so slightly in love with shrink plastic I
found an old stamp set with a nice teapot and teacup and shrank them to fit in
the corner and added a paper clay butterfly from the Martha Stewart range.

Sunday, 7 July 2013

OMG Andy Murray has just won Wimbledon!! Wow! I
didn’t watch the match (not too keen on tennis), my nerves couldn’t take it
anyway. But well done him. What a star!

Anyway it is another scorcher here in Oxfordshire. My poor dogs are walking around with their tongues
permanently hanging out. Wish I could do
that. Might try it later!

So, to my offering today.
I call it …..’Wake Up, Dad!’

War & Peace, a right riveting read.

I used Brenda Pinnack DP’s and the stamp is Fizzy Moon
coloured with Pro and Flexmarkers.

Close up.

The sentiment and ornate corners are Tattered Lace dies and
the word ‘Dad’ was made up using Britannia alphabet dies.I cut a ‘shadow’ for them all from the brown
card I used for matting.

Shadow die-cutting.

I decided that the whole design needed something extra so I
made a book using a Spellbinder die and scribbled words on the page (Shakespeare
it isn’t!). However I included a book
mark to make sure Fizzy Moon did not lose his place.

Friday, 5 July 2013

Boy it’s warm today, even in my office! I am very typically British in that I like to
moan when it’s too cold and then moan when it’s too hot. You see, I am always happy to ‘fly the flag’.

Well, today’s offering was inspired by Create and Craft’s premature
Christmas shows and all the lovely Christmas cards that seem to be popping up
in Blogland.

I call it…… umm ‘Bag’.
Well I couldn’t think of anything else.

The first side.

Close up of my slightly dodgy cutting out.

Love this image.

Who knew that Pumice Stone DI would turn silvery on Centura Pearl?

The other side.

More slightly dodgy cutting out. Oh dear.

I think that snowball gave that snowman his black eye!

I like to use things that have languished in my crafty stash
since the year dot! And while rooting
through I found some old Papermania Christmas papers in gorgeous icy lilac and chilly
grey and my winter S.W.A.L.K. stamps.

I really enjoyed colouring these images with my Pro &
Flexmarkers and I used some white gel pen for the highlights. I also used a lamppost and snowball image from
Jane Nestarenko’s Cute Companions range.
Well I did have a good old delve!

I treated myself the other day to the Spellbinders Layered
Poinsettia and 2013 Snowflake Pendant, so they have made an appearance too. Some pearls and Stickles later and I was
done.

I wish I had fussy cut the images a little closer than I did
but I wanted the little girl to still have her snowflakes falling on her. Oh well, will try harder next time.